I've just gotten back from Kepler's big Harry Potter launch party. Hi Alyssa! Hopefully you aren't too exhausted! I got my fortune read by a very soused Professor Trelawney, and apparently I am rational in many things, but not in love. Sad. I guess I will have to stop criticizing others for their stupid love mistakes. Oh wait...that would be me who's making the silly decisions. Boo.
I went to Kepler's with the fond memory of my last Harry Potter party, for book 5 at the Barnes & Noble in Irvine. I mean, I got a snitch and a pair of round, black Harry glasses.
But Kepler's was insane. There were SO many people there. And perhaps I wasn't with the right people, or my buzz was wearing off (I went out with my sister and her bf earlier), but I was sort of put off by the whole thing. I mean, the nasty, critical side of me just came roaring to life, and I was annoyed by the high school girls using the night as an excuse to wear slutty school uniforms, the overbearing parents, the mobs of middle schoolers, the group of high school asshats staging a Support Voldemort rally...honestly, it was a bit much. The cultural phenomenon felt like it had overpowered the simple story of good and evil. In the wake of the hoopla, I feel like I'd lost the crux of the whole thing--the books themselves. So now I have it, and it's sitting next to me on my desk, and I don't really have any desire to open it. I just want to sleep.
Another contributing factor to my placidity about the fate of Harry is that, well, I can always imagine an alternative ending. The Harry Potter phenomenon has spawned an entire world of alternatives based on people's imaginative spins on the characters--the world of fanfiction. I don't know how many of you are familiar with it, but fanfiction is basically taking characters from a book (or what you believe the characters to be) and using them in your own stories. There are similar communities for other cult phenomenon, like Star Wars or Lord of the Rings. My friend from high school was a huge celebrity in the Star Wars fanfic community--she told me that when she decided to retire, they held an online candlelight vigil to try to coax her back. It's the ultimate metaworld.
There are entire novel-length stories out there about the continuing adventures of Harry, Hermione, and the lot. Some carry the stories where J.K. Rowling vows never to go, into the adult world of careers and marriage and children. Many of them focus on aspects that Rowling neglects, or does poorly, such as romance. Alyssa and I were giggling the other day over the idea of a Harry and Draco romance, but there are legions of "shippers" out there who swear about the plausibility. What will happen to this construction when people read the final book and find out the REAL ending? Will it even matter? What happens when a fan community appropriates the characters from books and form canon around those characters? Part of me thinks it isn't necessarily all that bad, because it's all about inspiring that belief in another world, but the other part of me says--well, it's just cheating. It's not canon unless it's in the book. But sometimes it's fun to choose a different ending...
On that note, happy reading to all! And remember, there's always fanfiction!
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2 comments:
I'm sorry you didn't have fun, Karen! In our defense, all the kids I interacted with were lovely, and the Borders had to call the fire department because their book distribution was so out of hand. At least you got your book in a timely, safe manner.
As for fan fiction, I love the idea of stretching the limits of a world. I used to really like X-Files fanfic, which existed in remarkable quantity back in the day. Without giving too much away, this world remains open enough to explore further, but within canonic constraints. Let me know if you read anything good--I'm unlikely to seek it out myself. And, with respect to HP7, can we just say, OMG?! Amazing. Happy reading!
I know. I read it all in one night. OMG. But sad, somehow. I haven't pinpointed the source of my disappointment yet.
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